


Road Atlas

by Arsenic



Series: Discipline and Punish [66]
Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-12-20
Updated: 2007-12-20
Packaged: 2020-03-29 23:47:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19030417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arsenic/pseuds/Arsenic
Summary: Time to move forward.





	Road Atlas

The last night that Tommy lived with the four of them, Bob made the spaghetti and meatballs recipe that Phyllis had been kind enough to share with him and that Tommy loved. When they were finished, Bob packed up the leftovers and said, "We'll put them in your new fridge." Gerard labeled them with Tommy's name and a picture of a key, just in case it turned out that Jon Walker was a secret and devilish food hog.

They stayed up late talking, even though they had to be up early for the move. Well, four of them stayed up late. Frank had gone back to half-days of work a week earlier and it was all he could do to keep his eyes open and himself coherent twelve hours a day. They tried not to make fun of him when he started to fail. Gerard was bad at this and had often earned himself a cuff to the head from Mikey. Bob would reciprocate except a) Gerard deserved it, b) he wasn't really hurt, and c) Mikeyway.

In the end Mikey covered Frank with blankets and left him on the couch while Tommy shared Mikey's bed with him. It was the first time that Bob could remember Tommy ever transgressing that far into any of the spaces that were seen as belonging to one or two of them. They let Frank sleep the next morning while they were busy piling the few things Tommy had into the car and then woke him up for the ride over. He wanted to help carry things up the stairs, but Mikey vetoed that plan real quickly. There wasn't that much anyway. Instead Mikey sent him upstairs to sit on the couch and occasionally make comments about where thing should go. What they all learned was this: Frank was shit at interior design.

 

*

Bob told Gerard first because he was Gerard, and Bob told him everything first. He took Gerard out for a Sunday afternoon drive, the windows down to allow in the early fall weather, the radio on more loudly than was probably prudent. He took them to the suburbs where he parked outside a playground. Gerard went straight for the swings and Bob stood behind him, pushing him easily as he cut backward through the air. When Gerard showed signs of being ready to stop Bob caught the chains with his hands and waited for the momentum of the swing to come to a complete standstill. Gerard looked up at him, cheeks flushed, hair blown all askance from the wind. Bob said, "Jaguar," which hadn't been what he'd meant to say at all.

Gerard beamed up at him. The swing next to Gerard had been abandoned; Bob sat down and pushed himself so that he bumped gently into Gerard. Gerard bumped right back. Bob said, "We need a house."

Gerard almost fell backward off the swing. When he had recovered he asked, "Um, why?"

"Because we're a family and we have the money and we need it. We need the quiet and the sense of taking care of things ourselves and the right to do as we please to it."

Gerard planted his feet on the ground. "Bob, look. No offense, or anything, but they forced me to spend an entire year away from Mikey and I had to do that, but I'm never doing it again, okay? Ever."

Bob had a feeling one of them had skipped several steps in this conversation, and he was also pretty sure it hadn't been him. "What?"

"I know we have the money, but Mikey and Frank don't. And I'm not moving without Mikey. Sorry. But I'm not."

Bob frowned. "You think I would leave Mikey and Frank by themselves?"

"You said--"

"That we were a family." Bob thought that was pretty clear. "I figure a four bedroom. An extra for the guest room, so that Tommy can have a place to stay when he needs it. Or Linda if it snows, or something. And then one for you to have a studio."

Gerard started swinging again, slowly. "And a garage for you, right?"

Bob nodded, because if he answered, he was going to do something seriously unmanly, like squeak. When he had himself under control he said, "Somewhere near a park, so Mikey and Frank can walk MG."

Gerard said, "And maybe closer to the center."

"Definitely closer to the center," Bob agreed. They all spent too much time there to move any further away.

Gerard kicked at some of the wood chips beneath his feet. "I don't have the first clue about how to buy a house."

"Me neither, but Ryland helped Vicky buy one a couple of years back. I think he'd help if I asked."

"Ryland," Gerard said approvingly. "He knows things."

Bob switched his direction so that he bumped into Gerard again.

 

*

"A house?" Mikey asked.

"You know, to live in," Gerard said, sounding perfectly earnest. Almost four full years of living with him, five of being with him, and Bob still hadn't figured out how he managed that.

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure Mikey knows what a house is, Gee," Frank said. Bob would have scowled at him, but he sounded both subdued and exhausted. They should have waited until one of his days off to have this conversation. He was only taking one a week at the moment, since he only worked four hour days, but they could have waited until Sunday, talked at breakfast before church.

"Um." Mikey ran his finger over the spine of one of Gerard's drawing pads. "You know that Frank and I-- Rent's kinda the most we can afford right now, that's even with four of us in a two bedroom that hasn't had a rent increase in three years."

"We thought you could pay the same amount. Just to us. Until we've gotten the house paid off, or you feel like you can afford more, or whatever," Gerard explained.

"I dunno, Gee." Mikey tilted his head. "This isn't like-- Like the time I wanted that skateboard and so you figured out that you were just old enough to deliver papers."

"Looked good on my resume," Gerard said. "Besides, you rode that thing until the _wheels fell off_ , Mikey. And then you put it on your wall. I think we still have it in storage."

Mikey perked up. "Really?"

Gerard grinned. "I'll look. Fuck, I'd forgotten about that."

"You skated?" Frank asked.

Mikey shrugged. "I was a kid."

"I had rollerblades," Frank said, with a definite air of reminiscence.

"Wow," Mikey said with a faint tinge of awe.

Before he got a little too carried away by how ridiculously cute the two of them could be--Bob would have liked to have said he was immune to it, but Bob also tried not to lie--Bob said, "House."

Mikey and Frank looked at each other and conversed with their minds for a few minutes. Frank smiled softly at Mikey and Mikey rolled his shoulders, asked Gerard, "Will you help me paint our room?"

 

*

Ryland said, "I can help you with the financing and all that, but I can't help you actually find a house."

Vicky said, "Craigslist. It's a clusterfuck, but if you're patient it turns some good shit up."

Gerard had already started looking. Sometimes he cooed at the houses and declared them his Dream House until four links down, when he found something he loved even more. Mikey made a lot of fun of him, but Bob had noticed Mikey watching over Gerard's shoulder an awful lot. Bob nodded.

"And be careful if you use realtors, because they will fuck you up the ass dry." Vicky popped a grape into her mouth.

"Tell me how you really feel," Bob said dryly.

Vicky smirked. "You couldn't handle it, Bryar."

 

*

The first place they looked at wouldn't come down to their negotiated price, and the second place was a total pit. The third place caused Frank to start coughing, and Mikey to rush him out of there faster than Bob had ever seen Mikey move, _ever_. The fourth place had structural damage, the fifth was sold before they ever saw it and the sixth was so ugly that Gerard blinked at it and said, "I can't go home to that every day."

Gerard had bought Bob the most beautiful car ever, so Bob really wasn't going to make him live someplace where the aesthetics depressed him. The seventh had a termite problem and the eighth was further from public transportation than they had thought it would be. The tenth creeped Mikey the hell out--Mikey's words, not Bob's.

Bob was about to say fuck it when the eleventh house showed up on Craigslist. It was actually Frank who saw it and said, "Well, it says it needs work, and it's only three bedrooms, but it's lower than our maximum and I bet, if we like it, we can get them to come down a little."

Bob was fairly certain none of them were expecting to like it, and it wasn't love at first sight, but for all that, it was Gerard who put his head into the center of their huddle and said, "We can repaint."

Mikey said, "The layout's pretty nice. And we even share a little bit of a yard, for Mizzy."

Frank said, "The kitchen's eat-in, so we could put Gee's studio in the dining room. He'd be easier to keep an eye on anyway."

Gerard nodded. "And the carpet's gotta go anyway, so we could put linoleum down in there. Or just stay with the concrete."

Bob said, "We can put shag in our room."

Mikey rolled his eyes. Bob laughed. "So. We gonna make an offer?"

" _You're_ the leader of this expedition," Frank told him.

"And by that, he means you look the most imposing and therefore the most likely to get us what we want," Mikey whispered. Gerard laughed.

 

*

Bob and Gerard both put suits on to go to the bank. Ryland also put on a suit, but that seemed to make sense. Ryland was an _accountant_. Bob shook hands with the bank representative, as did Gerard, but then he let Ryland handle the talking. He had a vague sense that they wanted a low interest rate, but not much of an idea of how one got such a thing. Eventually, Ryland smiled and said, "Very well then," and looked at Bob and Gerard, "Is that acceptable to you?"

Bob had them run through the exact numbers one more time. They looked pretty close to what the four of them had jointly decided would work. Bob nodded, and then he and Gerard signed a whole bunch of papers, Bob expecting someone to call him on being a total fake the entire time. When they walked out, Ryland said, "Well. Three-fourths of the way to being a homeowner." They closed the next week.

Gerard hopped a little bit, and Bob grinned. Ryland said, "You should know Gabe threatened my life and identity if I didn't invite him to lunch with us afterward."

"There's the way to win a guy's heart." Gerard laughed. Ryland blinked.

Gently, Bob said, "You should maybe call him, then."

"Right," Ryland said. "Right."

 

*

Gerard brought home the contract for the house and showed Mikey every single spot where he had signed his name. Mikey followed along, never once looking away. Frank tried, but he had finally started back at full time that week and he fell asleep on Mikey by the second signature. Mikey just shifted to take the weight and kept watching. He said, "Home, Gee."

Gerard nodded. "I was thinking maybe we could paint it grandma's favorite colors."

"Except orange. Orange is a bad color for a house."

"Yeah, true."

Mikey looked back at Bob. "What colors do you want?"

Bob came and sat with them, squeezing into the couch despite it really being too small for all four of them. Bob said, "I like blue."

Gerard looked at him and smiled. "That was her absolute favoritest. Very berry blue."

Gerard had told Bob that before, but Bob wasn't going to mention it. He leaned down and kissed Gerard. "They say blue is calming."

"Yeah." Gerard looked thoughtful. "Maybe some red for the bedrooms."


End file.
